When darkness falls on light
by Lycan-Song
Summary: Axel, as assassin of the Organisation, has refused to extinguish Roxas' light from the worlds. It now falls to Saix to change his mind, or deal out the punishment for disobedience.


**When darkness falls on light**

**(A disclaimer, how delightfully fun! **

**I cannot claim, no matter how much I'd like to, in all honesty that the characters of Kingdom Hearts used or mentioned in this fanfic are my original ideas. They belong to Square Enix and the Disney Corporation. I do not for a moment declare this story to be canon; it is simply something that was inspired from game footage. Hope you enjoy it! Please review/leave comments.**

**Please note that though technically this is a continuation from another fanfic I've written called 'Hurt', I don't think it is necessary to read it before you read this one. But if you do want the other one as well, you can find it easily at the bottom of my fanfiction profile. Please feel free to review/comment on it too.)**

_I'm sorry._

Those had been Roxas' last words. They alone were the final echo of the boy's voice left to resonate as a lingering pain through Axel's mind.

His heart was back, Roxas had returned it. Even now, Axel felt his heart beat and throb, hurting him. Was the pain he was feeling just a sign of its return after its long absence? Or was it the ache which every heart feared to feel, the ache of losing the one you love?

Axel sat alone on the ledge of the clock tower in Twilight Town. His bright green eyes reflected the gentle orange of the setting sun as the solar eye sank lower and lower into the glittering sea which stretched across the false horizon, succumbing to the unstoppable might of the encroaching darkness that suppressed it so the blackest hours could reside once more over the landscape of the World Which Never Was.

"You haven't left yet."

The voice came from behind. The figure's hood was up but Axel knew who it was; the hard stance, the voice tinted with a subtle toxicity, the sense of danger which the Nobody resonated outwards at all times.

"What do you want Saix?" Axel asked, blatantly uncaring, something he knew would infuriate his fellow Organisation member- it didn't take much to infuriate the deceptively calm Saix.

Then something surprising happened. Saix walked forward and sat down on the ledge beside Axel.

Several moments passed and nothing was spoken, the pair just gazed silently out, watching as the sunset entered its final stage. A touch of the light sea-breeze wafted up to the Tower's heights, brushing cool fingers over Axel's static frame. Even this brief contact was enough to make the red-head's mind immediately flash back, engaging with stolen memories of when Lea and Isa were sitting together on this very ledge, or what would have been this ledge in a real world, chatting about nothing in particular as they watched the sun go down, never fearing the coming night nor embracing it.

They were eating sea-salt ice-cream and truffles which Lea's mum had given Isa for the boy's 15th birthday. Golden sunlight sparkled across the surface of Isa's eyes as he held up the bracelet his ginger friend had given him earlier, the smooth surface of a silver crescent moon hanging from it reflecting one small bead of failing light, appearing like a star on the moon's surface. Isa had loved the moon, he had been a proper nerd about it; the two boys were actually waiting for the sun to go down just so the giant full moon above them could enter its true hour of splendour. Isa's smile suddenly broadened and he looked over at Lea.

"Hey Lea, if I told you I was thinking of dying my hair purple, what would you say?"

"I'd say stick with blue. And why the heck would you choose purple? If you're going to choose anything, choose red, red is geeewd. Plus the gingers are outnumbered."

"One ginger is more than enough charming stupidity in my life, thank you," Isa said with a grin as he gave the bracelet a quick spin around his wrist.

"I'd be offended if you hadn't complimented me at same time as insulting me," Lea replied, looking quite pleased that someone had called him "charming" even if it was in jest. "So, come on, cough up the reason, why purple?"

"Coughing up? Okay, gross, I'm not a cat. And I dunno why I like the idea of purple exactly. I just wanted to try something new, see how people react."

"How are you expecting them to react?"

"I'm thinking with pitchforks mostly."

"Pitchforks? You really think they'll drive you out of town just for changing your hair colour? I know some of the children around here think you're a freak, but people aren't scared of you _that_ much."

"I give children nightmares, I love it. And I wasn't planning on them kicking me out just for the hair colour, I was also thinking that if I'm bothering to dye my hair purple then I'd also dye my skin green, put in red contacts, grow my fingernails really long, wear a lot of eyeliner and then jump out at people yelling "GIMME YOUR SOUL!""

"Yeah, they would definitely drive you out for that."

"You sound very sure of that."

"I am, because I'd be helping them."

Isa punched Lea on the shoulder and grinned broader.

"I blame the full moon for this, I really do, Isa. It's Christmas and you're still stuck back in Halloween," Lea said, placing his hands behind his head as he saw the moon become that little bit clearer as the light of the sun subsided.

"What can I say; it's a great time of year," Isa replied, also looking up as he lay down beside Lea onto the blankets they had laid out. Both of them blew out clouds of condensed breath into the wintry air as they finished off their ice-cream, looking up at the pale disc of the moon just above them with the first stars appearing amidst its beams.

"He's getting away."

Saix's cold voice encapsulated the chill of the winter ice-cream, but without the comfort. The organisation member's hood was down along with the sun; the long blue hair hanging over his cloak was like the darkness which now hung over the scene. The warmth of the day was gone with the warmth of the memory, but this wasn't due to the cold of the night, it was caused by the chill that Saix exuded from what remained of his echo of a soul. A replicated body, frozen in the space between existences, forged from the darkness to live without the comforting beat of a heart, but rather the cold copies of memories which the Nobodies didn't deserve and didn't even have the emotions to miss or grieve over.

"I will not destroy Roxas," Axel said, stating the fact simply, determined that Saix would never succeed in forcing him to change his decision.

"Why not?" The anger hadn't come yet; Saix was still staring forward and talking as if he didn't overly care about the conversation at all. He hadn't even looked at Axel yet, he was appearing almost harmless. It was the truest deception the Nobody practised, but Axel wasn't in the right head space at the moment to put up with Saix's mind games.

"I stopped wanting to explain myself to you ages ago, Saix," Axel said, getting to his feet and beginning to walk away.

All centres of gravity were suddenly flung wide as Axel felt a force on the back of his neck. His body was twisted round and his back hit the stone wall of the tower's top with a painful thump.

Saix's face was an inch from Axel's own, close enough to feel the bursts from the blue-haired one's deep breaths.

"I'm sick of this," Saix hissed.

"No, you're just sick, seek a vet."

Long cracks stretched out towards Axel from a cobweb of shattered stone as Saix slammed his fist into the wall beside his head.

"_Why do you care so much_?" Saix growled, still breathing heavily, as if struggling to control himself. "You're not supposed to feel anything; _we _cannot feel anything so why the _hell_ are you doing this?"

"My heart is back, Saix."

Saix stopped breathing, or at least the nostrils stopped flaring as wildly as the Nobody froze. Then he spoke again, and his voice pressed forward like a blade.

"_How_?"

"It was Roxas. Roxas gave it back to me."

Saix removed his grip on Axel's throat and slid his leather-bound hand slowly down Axel until it pressed against the middle of the red-head's chest, forcing the zip to lower on Axel's cloak as the hand came to rest on bare skin.

"Think about him," Saix said. "Think about your little blond brat. Think about whatever it was that gave you your heart back."

Axel did so gladly. He thought about Roxas, of his smile, his eyes, his voice, the way he had made Axel feel he could be good again, the way Roxas' lips had pressed against his, the way light had returned to an existence of pure darkness. He thought about how they had connected together against all odds and had broken the curse of the Organisation that had been binding Axel in chains to a destiny that would keep him alone and unfeeling. He thought about how together, he and Roxas had won.

Axel's heart beat hard, thumping up with vigour to pound the roof of his chest, adrenaline rushing through his blood in mighty bursts, excited with ecstasy at the knowledge that somewhere in the worlds Roxas was still alive, how they were both breathing, victorious after setting one another free.

Saix hadn't spoken yet; he was just staring at where his hand was pressing into Axel's skin.

"You feel it, don't you?" Axel said. "You know it's there. You know it's back."

The hard yellow eyes rose up and looked straight into Axel's own. Then the hand grabbed Axel's hand and twisted it into an outstretched palm before being placed on the chest. Axel could feel his heart pumping away, hammering in his ears with life and existence, but below his hand, he felt nothing. There was no movement, no impact, no nothing. Total nothingness.

Axel's face contorted with pain. For the second time he had lost his heart. Although this time it had been different, he had never had it in the first place. But... everything he had felt. He had cried real tears, he had felt ache and pain, he had felt anguish, he had felt love for Roxas and euphoria at the touch of his lips; he'd... imagined it all. His brain had amalgamated every good feeling and every pain he had ever felt from his life as a Somebody and thrown it with desperate force into the empty space because it would have shredded Axel's mind into madness to have kissed Roxas and felt nothing. The brain had done what it was supposed to do, what it had been doing ever since Axel had become a Nobody, it had protected itself by replicating emotion. His heart wasn't back. It had all been in his head.

_Always in his head, never in his heart._ Saix had told him that once.

Saix. He was watching his former friend closely.

Placing one hand on the side of Axel's face, and then the other on the opposite side, Saix leaned forward so his forehead touched Axel's. The Number VII closed his eyes and sighed.

"I'm sorry, Lea. It's not back."

"I was so sure..."

"It's okay... Just... don't think about it."

"Isa-"

Axel stopped himself. This wasn't Isa; this was Saix, nothing had changed.

"I don't care," Axel said, pushing Saix away and walking a few paces towards the door which led to the staircase.

"I don't care," he reiterated, "that that wasn't my heart. It was what Roxas gave me, it doesn't matter if it was fake, he gave it to me and-"

"Lea!" Saix cut him off, approaching Axel again. For the first time ever Axel heard a plea in his voice. "You don't need Roxas! You _never_ needed Roxas! _I _am going to give you back your heart! Your real heart! _Me_! That's what I've been working at all this time; _I_ am going to save us! I never forgot about you, Lea, not for a moment of this existence! I couldn't, even though it would have made things easier for me. I did everything I did so we could escape all this, so we could become Somebodies again."

Axel's brain couldn't take this in. Saix had betrayed him; he had devoured Isa and abandoned the newborn Axel in favour of chasing after power with Xemnas. Now here Saix was telling him that he'd been wrong again, that everything he'd felt, all the loneliness and grief he had suffered through had been nothing. That he'd never been abandoned at all.

"But when I asked you that time, you said we were better off this way."

"Of course I said that! Think about it! If I'd said anything else, you would have gone off on your own and done something stupid! You would have taken risks; you would have put yourself in danger! You would have gotten yourself on the losing side and went against the Superior so much so that not even I would have been able to intervene for you! Look at what happened when I didn't keep a close eye on you! When I let myself get distracted just _once_! You went and joined _Marluxia_ in his idiotic revolution attempt! Do you know how hard it was to find enough feasible reasons for the Superior to stop you being eliminated with the rest of them! I had to _lie_ to the Superior, something I promised him I'd never do, something which, if he'd found out, everything I've worked for all this time would be lost in a second! I told him you were on our side, I told him over and over again until he believed me that you were working with me to infiltrate the group and get close enough to assassinate the traitors! I've watched every single word I've said since then, all to keep him from destroying you. "

"You were protecting me?"

"I begged and pleaded and worked my way to the top of the organisation, I bowed down to every one of the Superior's demands and requests, I became his dog to keep you safe and guarantee us first honours when Kingdom Hearts is completed. I can get you your heart back, Lea, your real heart, not some illusion."

Saix reached out again, but Axel knocked his arm away.

"You were _protecting me_? You seriously thought you were protecting me? Do you have _any_ idea what you did to me? You left me alone, Saix. When we became Nobodies, I was scared, _properly_ scared, and then that feeling began to fade. I still remember what it was like to feel that much fear, complete and total terror, and then to have it just drain away, to have it feel like something was sucking it out of me slowly. Sometimes I still think about how I tried to contain it, to grab it and hold onto it. It was the worst thing I had ever felt, it was fear _that bad_, and I didn't want to let it go because I knew that when I lost it I wouldn't feel anything again. I needed a friend, Saix, my best friend, I needed Isa. And you left me alone. I may not have truly felt anything after that, I may not have felt real "loneliness", but I still had a brain which told me that something was wrong, that I had no-one. And those thoughts tortured me, even when I couldn't feel anything. You left me and chased after Xemnas and power."

"So I could protect you-"

"Shut up! Do you know why I joined Marluxia? Do you know why I did so many stupid things that _inconvenienced_ you while you played the good beastie on the Superior's lap? I was trying to keep myself alive! I thought any one of the others in the Organisation would kill me, or have me killed, at any moment. I thought you'd abandoned me, I thought I had no-one to help me during the worst thing that had ever happened to me. I needed someone to help me, and the person most willing to do that was _freaking Marluxia_!"

"I should have told you what I was doing, I see that now. I just thought I had to keep everything secret, I'm sorry."

"To feel sorry means to feel something. Stop trying to wear Isa's face, Saix, you're nothing like him. Isa wouldn't have left me; Isa would have known I needed him beside me, not above me dictating my actions from a distance. That's why I clung to Roxas so bad, that's why I needed him so much, because until he came along I had nothing; just an emptiness and no-one to help me get rid of it! That's what you did to me, Saix, that's why I don't care about all the things you think you've done for me, that's why I won't kill Roxas for you! That's why I hate you!"

Saix stood still. For the first time his face registered confusion, doubt, incomprehension. The face turned away towards the tower's edge, as if looking towards the sea.

Axel didn't care. Saix didn't want him to have a heart, fine, he wouldn't for him, but for every other time Axel wanted to have a heart, he'd have one.

"You can keep your real heart," Axel said and turned away also. "I prefer the illusion."

Behind him, a single tear rolled down Saix's cheek. As it curved around the face and over the quivering mouth, the lips started twitching sharply and turned up, teeth baring as, with a feral yell of rage, Saix's body spun around, Lunatic appearing from the ether into the grip of its wielder's hand, aiming straight for the other Nobody, crashing through the tower's stone wall as it did so, buffeting Axel with masonry and sending him falling amidst a mass of broken debris over the ledge. Saix jumped after him, diving straight down with claymore still in hand, gaining speed as the wind whipped around him.

"!"

For the first time ever, Saix wasn't calling him Lea.

**(Liked it, didn't like it? Please review or just leave a short comment. Either is appreciated, I've written a few things now and have barely got any feedback so anything you write which isn't abusive trolling is great. Thanks and, just in case you skipped over the disclaimer, this is a continuation from another fanfic of mine called 'Hurt' which you can easily find at the bottom of my profile. Thanks again for reading this! **

– **Lycan-Song.)**


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